Hey, I am just wondering if it is possible to burn music on DVDs using iTunes, exactly like you do on CDs. For example, I want music on DVDs so that I can put it in my Mac and be able to re-burn it onto my computer (through iTunes) like you would do to a CD. I want to do this so I can re-burn all my music in higher quality because I would rather not have to use CDs. Thanks.
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iPod Music on DVDs, Possible?
- Thread starter Zwhaler
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just back up you whole entire library or put all your music in a playlist and burn to a cd or dvd.
To get a higher quality rip, you'll have to make it from a higher quality source. Burning your current music collection to a disc and re-importing will reduce the quality. A higher bitrate will not equate to higher quality using this method because the source is low quality to begin with. Further compressing a compressed source will just increase the file size while destroying more data and possibly introducing audible artifacts. You can't put back the data that was taken out during compression. Like the saying goes "garbage in, garbage out."
If this is so, then how come I can take any CD and burn it to 320kbps? Does this mean that "320kbps" does not actually mean higher quality, if it was burned from a source with 192 kbps, for example?
Also, if this is true, does that mean that all CDs (bought from the store) are already at a predetermined bitrate, and that importing them at a higher quality than that bitrate does nothing but take up space? Can someone explain this to me
So, you have music that you ripped at, lets say 192, currently on your computer. You then want to put this music onto a DVD, take said DVD and import the music into iTunes at a higher bit-rate?
If that is the case it will not work. 192kbps copied to a DVD is still...192kbps. If you try taking the 192kbps DVD, and ripping it at a rate > 192kbps, you will hear no difference, and might even hear some unwanted artifacts depending on the compression scheme being used by the program.
What you want to do is go back to the original CD source, and re-rip the songs at a higher bit-rate. CDs are at a predetermined bit-rate, which is 1411kbps for a normal red book stereo file from a CD.
And if I totally misunderstood you intention, I blame it on the Dixie Blackened Voodoo I have been drinking tonight.
If that is the case it will not work. 192kbps copied to a DVD is still...192kbps. If you try taking the 192kbps DVD, and ripping it at a rate > 192kbps, you will hear no difference, and might even hear some unwanted artifacts depending on the compression scheme being used by the program.
What you want to do is go back to the original CD source, and re-rip the songs at a higher bit-rate. CDs are at a predetermined bit-rate, which is 1411kbps for a normal red book stereo file from a CD.
And if I totally misunderstood you intention, I blame it on the Dixie Blackened Voodoo I have been drinking tonight.
An original CD is in an uncompressed format, while MP3 and AAC are highly compressed "lossy" formats, because they discard much of the data of the original music. That's why an Audio CD can only hold about 80 minutes of data, but an MP3 CD can hold 10+ hours.
If you take a song that was encoded as a 192kbps AAC file and burn it to disc as a CD Audio file, it will still sound the same as the AAC file while having about 10x the file size. If you then encode that CD Audio file as a 320kbps AAC file, it will lose a bit of the quality from the 192kbps AAC file because it is being re-compressed and even more of the data is being discarded.
If you want to increase the sound quality of your songs, you will need a source of higher quality than your intended target quality, otherwise you're just increasing the size of your files without adding any quality.
The standard bitrate for an Audio CD is around 1400kbps, so encoding at 320kbps only retains about 23% of the audio data, the other 77% is considered by the encoder to be insignificant data and is discarded. I know that this is a gross simplification, so if someone else can go into more detail, feel free.
The AAC encoder in iTunes is highly advanced and based on years of research and testing, and it is widely believed that at a bitrate of 320kbps is indistinguishable from an uncompressed source.
If you take a song that was encoded as a 192kbps AAC file and burn it to disc as a CD Audio file, it will still sound the same as the AAC file while having about 10x the file size. If you then encode that CD Audio file as a 320kbps AAC file, it will lose a bit of the quality from the 192kbps AAC file because it is being re-compressed and even more of the data is being discarded.
If you want to increase the sound quality of your songs, you will need a source of higher quality than your intended target quality, otherwise you're just increasing the size of your files without adding any quality.
The standard bitrate for an Audio CD is around 1400kbps, so encoding at 320kbps only retains about 23% of the audio data, the other 77% is considered by the encoder to be insignificant data and is discarded. I know that this is a gross simplification, so if someone else can go into more detail, feel free.
The AAC encoder in iTunes is highly advanced and based on years of research and testing, and it is widely believed that at a bitrate of 320kbps is indistinguishable from an uncompressed source.
In response to your original question of burning songs onto a DVD in an Audio CD format, I just decided to sacrifice a DVD-R and find out. The answer seems to be that iTunes won't do it. If you choose Audio CD as the format in the Burning Preferences and try to burn a playlist onto a DVD, iTunes throws a pop-up asking if you wish to create a data DVD instead.
Ok thanks for the replies. I really wish I knew this before spending hours and hours importing 5000+ songs off of CDs... back then I didn't even know I could control the quality. I can't do that again, so I guess I am pretty much screwed.
Just replace them one or two disks everyday, and, provided you still have all of the disks, you will be done fairly quick.
And have you done any comparison tests to see if you can even hear the difference between 192 and 320, and if you can, is it worth the work to re-rip them? 192 is fine for some, while others (like me), still have some of our music collection in uncompressed .aiff files.
And have you done any comparison tests to see if you can even hear the difference between 192 and 320, and if you can, is it worth the work to re-rip them? 192 is fine for some, while others (like me), still have some of our music collection in uncompressed .aiff files.
I have done some tests to compare higher quality music, and I admit 192 is good enough for me, what I have not yet said is that most my music is in 128kbps, and I want to get it into 192. I can tell the difference between 128 and 192, which is why I want to get higher quality.
Many DVD players play MP3 CDs, and if they do that, they usually play MP3 DVDs as well. If you haven't ripped your music in MP3 format (I haven't) proceed as follows:
1. Make a playlist, probably with 50+ hours of music.
2. Convert the playlist to MP3 format. Takes ages, so do that overnight
3. Burn the playlist in "MP3 CD" format. When asked to put in an empty CD, put in an empty DVD instead.
4. Most likely you'll want to get rid of the MP3s. Sort your library on "Date added to library"; the MP3s that you just converted should all be together so you can delete them together.
My £20 DVD player is quite happy with DVDs full of music created that way; I think I could put about 90 CDs or so on one DVD and play them through the TV.
But that's only 500 CDs or so...
When I did it, the fastest method I could figure out was: Import in AIFF format; no compression whatsoever (that minimises the time you need to sit with your computer). Set it up to import + eject CD automatically, then all you need is shoving in the CDs. Borrow another computer for twice the speed
Then convert to lossless overnight, burn on data DVDs for backup, and convert to 320 Kbit AAC or whatever you want.
Ahhhh.
Well, I will say that the work of re-ripping at a higher bit-rate is very much worth it if your collection is at 128. 128 makes my ears bleed, well not literally.
My apologies for thinking your music was at 192kbps: late night + beer + my normal reading comprehension issues, hehe.Now go and get to re-encoding those disks!
The thing is, is that your music is at 128 allready. The data is allready gone, as others have said. Changing 128 to 192 will not make it sound better, infact will make it sound worse from double compression. Burning an audio cd and then reimporting has the same effect. When audio is recompressed from another format or bitrate, the audio encoder has to read an uncompressed waveform, to make a new compressed file.
If you want the new higer quality, you have to reimport from the uncompressed source, like the audio cd.